In this anchorage, when the wind goes to the East North East, there is a little swell, really a wind chop with a longer fetch. This gives the boat some up and down motion. This is when Isobel starts to challenge her self to balance in different places and to see if she can run around the boat, etc…

The Selden Furlex is ready for a genoa: I took it apart and used grease to repack all the bearings, I turned halyard end for end, so I could cut off a couple feet of line that is worn where the line feeds through the fittings and sheaves at the top of the mast. The furling line has been inspected and run through the stantion blocks. And the Spinlock rope clutches have all been cleaned an lubricated. Now, if the wind would die down a bit (currently 15 knots), we could bend on the sail.

Also, some of you may see the white floats in the water beyond the bow… those are floats on the anchor chain. We do this to float the chain over little coral heads that are on the bottom. Ideally the floats would have just enough air to keep it afloat… then when the wind goes up the chain would be pulled down into the water… Well, we will get it worked out, for now, we can pull the anchor without the excitement of having to dive to direct the boat driver to unwind the chain from the coral heads. Of course, the other reason to do this is so, if the wind really builds, we have proper scope out rather than have the chain bound up around the coral. We have heard stories of boats caught in a squall with their chain bound up… breaking the chain and drifting off… We definitely don’t want that to happen. I should credit our friends on SV Salsa for this technique, although we have heard it from several others since…